


broken glass brains (and how not to get caught on the edges)

by ell (amywaited)



Category: Marvel
Genre: All hurt, Angst, Breakup Fic, Hurt, M/M, hes kind of abusive, no comfort, steve is a bit of a prick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 03:03:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18002582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amywaited/pseuds/ell
Summary: steve is somewhat stuck in his ways. tony just wants to do more.





	broken glass brains (and how not to get caught on the edges)

**Author's Note:**

> beta-d by my darling [kait](https://starksnack.tumblr.com). go tell her nice things
> 
> (alternate titles, as suggested by my friends rach and masha, respectively, 'its not snoo, its snee' and 'you're no longer the snee to my snaw'.)
> 
> so heres a quick thanks to rach, masha, alex, and kait, all of whom contributed to this fic (regardless of how small their contribution was). u guys rock. love u.

It starts with an argument. It usually does these days. Tony never knows quite how to deal with them, but Steve is remarkably good at fracturing him in places he never thought he could break.

Steve is remarkably good at a lot things, really, and most of them end up with Tony getting hurt, even if he wasn’t supposed to.

The problem, Tony thinks, is that they’re both so… self aware. Pepper would say stubborn, but Tony isn’t Pepper. 

Steve is also kind of old fashioned, but he would never say it to his face. Steve is also the sort of person who like to throw things when he’s angry, and Tony would rather not get hit with a shoe again, because the bruises took forever to fade.

Steve says, “I wish you wouldn’t make jokes like that to the journalists.”

“Joke like what?” Tony asks, swirling the ice in the bottom of his glass and staring dead straight ahead of him.

“Calling Clint a slut,” Steve says. He drops a newspaper in Tony’s lap and Tony very deliberately doesn’t jump. “You could at least look at me.”

“Why would I want to do that?” Tony says, because apparently he doesn’t have any self preservation instincts to speak of. Or complete disregard for his current state of health, which is actually doing better than it has in the past few years. Or both, which is probably a really horrible combination.

Steve breathes in and out really slowly. “Because I’m trying to talk to you. It’s common courtesy to look at someone when they address you.”

“You haven’t addressed me,” Tony says because he likes poking sticks at bears. “How do I know I’m the one you’re talking to?”

“You’re the only one in the room, Tony! Who else could I be addressing?!”

Tony shrugs. “Maybe we have ghosts.”

“Ghosts-!” Steve cuts himself off. “You’re being really disrespectful right now, and I’d appreciate if you looked at me when I spoke to you.”

Tony sighs, balancing his glass on his knee. The ice in the bottom of it seeps cold water through his pants, but he finally looks up to meet Steve’s eye. “What? Usually when someone avoids eye contact, it means they don’t want to talk to you.”

Steve’s jaw tightens. “We need to talk about this.”

“About what? Next you’ll be telling me I started the economic crisis,” Tony says. “There’s nothing  _ to  _ talk about.”

“How do you know Clint is comfortable with you calling him slurs like that in public?”

Tony makes a face. “Because Clint makes them himself, and also, he’s brave enough to tell me whenever I overstep a boundary. I don’t need you to police my friendships for me.”

“I’m not policing your friendships, I’m making sure that everyone is comfortable,” Steve says, “and you making those jokes makes me uncomfortable. You’ll paint the team in a bad light if you keep it up.”

“Oh, like we haven’t already been painted in a bad light,” Tony says. “We’re world renowned murderers, Steve. We’re way past bad lighting.”

“We’re not murderers.”

“Our civilian death count is off the charts,” Tony stands up. He forgets about the glass, and it falls to the floor, smashing upon impact. He crunches right through the shards to spit in Steve’s face. “It’s sickening.”

“We have a reputation-”

“Our reputation is in shambles, Steve, and I don’t know how you’re so blind as to not see that. We might save the world, but more than enough people die in our attempts. Have you not noticed how we rarely make things better? Everyone is afraid of us.”

“It’s better that everyone is afraid of us but safe,” Steve says stiffly.

“Isn’t it better that they trust us to save them, too?” Tony counters.

It’s not the first time they’ve had this argument, and it probably won’t be the last. Tony knew what he was getting into when he started dating Steve (read, strong moral backbone and unwillingness to back down from a fight), all of which started off as something he… loved in Steve.

But now, he’s not so sure. Steve is so uptight, and controlling, and Tony kind of gets it but he hates it.

“We need to save as many people as we can,” Steve says.

Tony huffs out, “this isn’t the Game of Life, Steve. You can’t just restart when you fuck up, you know? People die because of us, and we can prevent that. You just refuse to because you’re stuck. You’re only looking forward when sometimes you need to look back. We’re human,” he says. “There’s no point pretending we’re something we’re not. And we’re trying to save humans, and they need to trust us. All we’re doing is killing people, but we need to be more.”

“We’re doing this for the greater good,” Steve says. “You’re smart, aren’t you? Surely you know that theory.”

There’s never an end to this argument. Tony knows that, and he’s tired of it. “There’s the greater good and then there’s carelessly killing a load of people in our collateral damage,” Tony says. He thinks he’s including himself in collateral damage, which hurts to think about, so he doesn’t.

“But we’re not carelessly killing people.”

“We’re killing more people than we’re saving, that’s for sure,” Tony says. “I don’t want to have this argument with you, Steve, but you have to understand; you’re not the only one on this team. You’re not the only one in the world, and your decisions are life changing. They might not affect you, but they affect someone else.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Steve says.

“I do think you don’t know that. And I think you’re… unfit to be the Captain of the Avengers,” Tony continues. “And I’m sorry. Because we could have rocked worlds, you know? But instead of rocking them, we’re ruining them. And if there’s anything I can do to prevent that, I’m going to do it.”

“So you’re… what? Leaving the Avengers? Breaking up with me?” Steve asks. Tony tries to ignore how his face turns sour. “It’ll be good riddance.”

Tony knows that this is how Steve gets. That this is how Steve is. There’s nothing he can change with it, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less, hearing him say it out loud, poison dripping from his tone.

Steve is remarkably good at a lot of things. He’s good at wrapping his words in candied cyanide, and Tony is good at flying blind. 

“We were good together, Steve,” Tony says, because maybe he’s finally learning how to break off a relationship civilly. “We could have been better.”

And that’s kind of it. Tony stands in a puddle of crushed glass and melting ice and he feels his whole world fall apart around him, and there’s nothing he can do to stop it.

Somewhere, deep down, he’s okay with it.

**Author's Note:**

> slight context for this: ive wanted to title a fic 'broken glass brains' (or something akin to that) for ages, and i finally got around to it. then i said to my friends: 'hey give me three words and ill put them into this fic im writing'
> 
> ill see u next time! loving you always


End file.
